Photo courtesy Flickr user loveyousave via Creative Commons.
From the Department of Oh Noes: Britney Spears, whose pre-shaved-head acting debut in Crossroads blew us away, is now allegedly “in talks” to star in a movie involving the Holocaust. And time-travel. And, sigh, L’amour. Here’s the reported deal: the movie is called The Yellow Rose of Sophia and Eton, and the protagonist is a young woman named Sophia LaMont who creates a time-machine and goes back to the 1940s. She meets an undoubtedly hot if skinny young man named Eton. The hitch? He’s a concentration camp prisoner! Oh no! And he’s Jewish, but that’s not as much of an issue as the whole “imprisoned by Nazis” thing. What will Sophia and Eton do? Will their love survive Hitler’s evil scourge? Well, no. See, the star-crossed lovers zip out of WWII, but when they get to the future (and this is where it gets weird) they are THEN killed by Nazis.
Predictably, Jewish advocates and organizations are not happy about the casting, or the film itself. “In films that deal with the Holocaust, the script should be carefully chosen and the cast picked with care,” Charlotte Knobloch, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, said in Der Spiegel. “It is reprehensible to combine the issue of the Holocaust with Britney Spears in an attempt to secure financing for the film…” Yes, it is reprehensible. It’s also probably not a good idea to combine time-travel and the Holocaust in a film. Or if you do, at least get some appropriate talent (Natalie Portman?) and for goodness’ sake, don’t let the Nazis win.
